something of the wolf
by MegaBadBunny
Summary: "There's a choice here," he says softly (or maybe he thinks, or he dreams). "And it's got to be yours."


There is something of the Wolf about Rose Tyler.

It's a something that slithers into her brain every once in a while, quiet and sneaky and so subtle she could think she was imagining it. It whispers to her the birthdate of an Attryxian emperor in the year 850 local time, or nudges her away from a restaurant that will later be revealed to have an outbreak of food poisoning. She will suddenly remember all of the elements on the periodic chart—both Earth's and some other planets', as well—or she'll be able to recite half of a long-lost German fairytale. (Only half, and only in Middle High German.) Rose will have a sudden flash-vision of something terrible, of screeching brakes and a splash of red splattered on the sidewalk, and before she knows it, she's sprinting out into the road in 1923 London to save an old man from an oncoming automobile.

Sometimes, this something reminds her of the Vortex. How it tasted in the seconds before her memories deserted her, warm and metallic in her mouth. Bitter and salty, like blood. If she's lucky, she'll recall a strain of song, bright and fizzy in her ears. She would write it off as a side effect of traveling in the TARDIS, but she just knows it's deeper than that. Because on other days, if she's very, very unlucky, she hears Daleks screaming as a gold-shining human with the power of a god burns them alive.

She hears, but she doesn't remember, not really. Doesn't remember, doesn't _know_

but sometimes

she _dreams_

 _and the TARDIS looks into her and she opens her eyes and she sees, she sees it_ all.

 _Time_.

 _Space_.

 _Everything_.

all that is

 _The universe is made of points of light and some of them shine brighter than others but almost none of them shine more brightly than the Doctor. She finds him as easy as breathing and saves him from himself even as She scatters pieces of Her soul through time and space to lead them both here._

 _She brings life._

 _(She wraps Her fingers around Jack's heart—She_ is _Jack's heart—and it pulses to life again beneath Her touch, hot and pumping and iron-bitter and forever)_

 _She brings death._

 _(The universe is full of dispersion forces and stable equilibrium and gravitational interaction but those are just words, pointless, meaningless, nothing but background noise in the face of creation, rules built only to be bent (broken); matter cannot be unmade but it can be undone and She ensures that the Daleks feel each and every attosecond in blinding, blistering detail)_

all that was

 _She doesn't know where She ends and the universe begins but She can smell-taste-feel the_ has-been's _and_ maybe was's _and_ used-to-be's _all around Her with every breath, with every endless intake of countless oxygen molecules that fill Her lungs and disperse into the ether just as slowly. She knows (feels, sees), in intimate detail, the life of each and every atom surrounding Her (within Her)—this one saw the dinosaurs, that one traveled galaxies, that one witnessed the Big Bang._

 _(She watches the Big Bang, holds the inception of all reality in the palm of one hand; it's surprisingly warm and so, so small)_

all that ever could be

 _(The universe is a root-system of timelines that unfurl and reach and stretch into eternity and She sees, She watches all of them; She sees the merging and splitting of cells that become a new life; She sees walls dissolving between worlds; She sees the spark of an idea smoldering in young Martha Jones' mind as she realizes she was born to be a physician; She sees Donna Noble choose to turn left; She sees Amelia Pond and the crack in her bedroom wall; She sees Death and the Void and the End of all Things, something even She cannot hold back._

 _So instead She returns Her attention to the Doctor, who still shines so brightly before Her, and She follows his time like a walk along a river, Her feet leaving gentle impressions in the riverbank-silt of the universe. His time splinters into a thousand-thousand branches and She sees all of them, smells the color and tastes the infinite possibilities of each. She watches timelines where he lives to the end of the universe, others where he dies and slowly, all of reality erodes with him; She sees others still where he grows into something wicked and terrible, his time invading the fabric-stuff of reality like a cluster of veins and arteries that sink claw-roots and tendril-teeth into everything and everyone, pumping and pulsing and blood-red; She tastes something like a penny in her mouth._

 _(Terrible; terrifying; awesome; still She loves him. Another thing She couldn't stop even if She wanted to.)_

 _She watches the Doctor don a new face to cheat Death, again and again; he has run for so long and he is very, very tired. He has seen it all before, nothing new under the sun, except_ She _sees something new even if he can't: a Doctor with a new-old face and only one heart and it is full of Her. She senses the warmth of his hand, the fit of his fingers in the spaces between Hers, the thrum of his heartbeat beneath Her palm, the gentle brush of his lips against Her mouth. Something catches in Her throat until She thinks She might choke from it; She can feel-hear-taste Her name coursing through his veins, singing Her praises with every pump of his fragile human heart._

 _(He no longer tastes of forever. Instead he smells of_ temporary _and_ vulnerable _and_ reckless _and he is so, so desperately in love, and with her of all people—not Her, but small, mortal, petty and human and flawed_ her _)_

 _"There's a choice here," he says softly (or maybe he thinks, or he dreams). "And it's got to be yours."_

 _She doesn't wonder what he's talking about; instead She_ feels _things shift into place, like a puzzle, a dance, a song she has always known the words to, if only she would_ listen _. She lifts a finger and a hand becomes a sacrifice becomes a symbol becomes a man, someone capable of happiness, who won't outrun it any more than he tries to keep outrunning Death. He'll wait patiently, for both, with Her._

 _(She chooses him.)_

Rose awakes with a start on the jumpseat. If the Doctor notices, he doesn't say anything.

(He's good at that. Not saying anything.)

Rose shakes her head, clearing cobwebs and lingering dream-traces away. It was just a dream, after all.

(Right?)

She settles back into the jumpseat and wills her pulse to slow. This isn't like those other times, those other things, she tells herself: those are all half-recalled facts and stories and visions. They're not made of smoke or metaphors or dream-stuff. They're tangible and real. Besides, if these strange dreams are another side effect of her connection to the TARDIS—indeed, if the things are related at all—it's a small price to pay for saving the Doctor's life. It doesn't mean anything; dreams never do. Already she can feel it slipping away, water through air, sand through her fingers.

(But her lips remember a kiss, her palm a single heartbeat, and she wonders.)


End file.
